Beatrice Arthur was an American actress and comedian.
Maria Owings Shriver is an American journalist, author, a member of the Kennedy family, former First Lady of California, and the founder of the nonprofit organization The Women's Alzheimer's Movement. She was married to former Governor of California and actor Arnold Schwarzenegger, from whom she filed for divorce in 2011. Shriver has received a Peabody Award and was co-anchor for NBC's Emmy-winning coverage of the 1988 Summer Olympics. As executive producer of The Alzheimer's Project, Shriver earned two Emmy Awards and an Academy of Television Arts & Sciences award for developing a "television show with a conscience". Her mother, Eunice Kennedy Shriver, was a sister of John F., Robert and Ted Kennedy. Shriver is currently a "special" anchor and correspondent for NBC News.
Watts is a neighborhood in southern Los Angeles, California. It is located within the South Los Angeles region, bordering the cities of Lynwood and South Gate to the east and southeast, respectively, and the unincorporated community of Willowbrook to the south.
California State University, Dominguez Hills is a public university in Carson, California. It was founded in 1960 and is part of the California State University (CSU) system.
Marsha Hunt is an American retired actress, model and activist, with a career spanning nearly 80 years. She is the oldest living and one of the last surviving actors from the Golden Age of Hollywood cinema. At 104, she is also the oldest living member of the Academy of Motion Pictures Arts and Sciences. She was blacklisted by Hollywood film studio executives in the 1950s during McCarthyism.
Tanquil "Tai" Lisa Collins is a model, actress, screenwriter, producer, philanthropist, and former Miss Virginia USA (1983).
James Webster Hill is a Los Angeles-based sportscaster and currently lead sports anchor and sports director at KCBS-TV. He is a former American football defensive back who played in the National Football League.
Judith Francisca Baca is an artist, activist, and professor of Chicano studies, world arts, and cultures based at the University of California, Los Angeles. She is the co-founder and artistic director of the Social and Public Art Resource Center (SPARC) in Venice, California. Baca is the director of the mural project that created the Great Wall of Los Angeles, which is the largest communal mural project in the world.
Jacqueline Woodson is an American writer of books for children and adolescents. She is best known for Miracle's Boys, and her Newbery Honor-winning titles Brown Girl Dreaming, After Tupac and D Foster, Feathers, and Show Way. After serving as the Young People's Poet Laureate from 2015 to 2017, she was named the National Ambassador for Young People's Literature, by the Library of Congress, for 2018–19. She was named a MacArthur Fellow in 2020.
Karen Ruth Bass is an American politician and social worker serving as the U.S. representative for California's 37th congressional district since 2011. The district, numbered as the 33rd district for her first term, covers several areas south and west of downtown Los Angeles. A member of the Democratic Party, she previously served for six years in the California State Assembly, the last two as speaker. Bass is a candidate in the 2022 Los Angeles mayoral election.
Jorja Leap is an American anthropologist and adjunct professor in the social welfare department at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). She is also Director of the Health and Social Justice Partnership at UCLA and is a nationally recognized gang expert.
Nina Revoyr is an American novelist and children's advocate, best known for her award-winning 2003 novel Southland. She is also executive vice president and chief operating officer of Children's Institute, Inc., which provides clinical, youth development, family support and early childhood services to children and families affected by trauma, violence and poverty in Central and South Los Angeles.
The Oasis is a 2008 Australian documentary produced by Shark Island Productions and directed by Ian Darling and Sascha Ettinger Epstein. The film explores the lives of homeless youth living in the Salvos Oasis youth refuge in Sydney. A 'ten years later' film was published in 2019 - Life After The Oasis.
The Watts Labor Community Action Committee (WLCAC) is a non-profit, 501 (c) 3 organization incorporated in the State of California, in 1965. Its mission "is to improve the quality of life for the residents of Watts and neighboring communities."
Irena Medavoy, aka Irena Ferris, is an American philanthropist, activist, and entrepreneur.
Willie J. Hagan is an American educator and public university administrator. He was the 7th president of California State University, Dominguez Hills, a public university located in the city of Carson, California in the South Bay region of Los Angeles County.
Myldred Jones was a US Navy officer and a consultant to then California Governor Ronald Reagan on youth and homelessness.
Phillip Neal "Phil" Butler was the eighth-longest-held U.S. prisoner of war (POW) held in North Vietnam during the Vietnam War. Butler, a Navy pilot, who was forced to eject after a mid-air explosion on April 20, 1965 and served as a prisoner of war in North Vietnam until his release as part of Operation Homecoming in 1973. Butler was one of the four POW's credited with establishing the tap code. The code enabled the prisoners to communicate with each other.
Julie Chávez Rodriguez is an American political rights activist and the director of the White House Office of Intergovernmental Affairs. She grew up in California in a well-known family of American labor and civil rights activists, the granddaughter of American labor leader, César Chávez and American labor activist Helen Fabela Chávez. From 2008 to 2016, Rodriguez served in the Obama administration, initially working for the United States Secretary of the Interior and later in the White House Office of Public Engagement.
Katherine Loker was an American heiress and philanthropist. She donated tens of millions of dollars to fund university programs and infrastructure improvement at California State University, Dominguez Hills, Harvard University, and the University of Southern California (USC). She also made significant contributions to the California Museum of Science and Industry, the California Hospital Medical Center in Los Angeles, the Donald P. Loker Cancer Treatment Center, the Los Angeles Music Center, and the Richard Nixon Library in Yorba Linda, among other institutions. She was honored in 1996 with the Harvard Alumni Association Medal and in 2007 received the Presidential Medallion, the highest award of USC. Loker was awarded an honorary doctorate from USC in 1997 and an honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degree from the Harvard in 2000. In 1999, The New York Times spotlighted her leading role in philanthropy. The rose 'Katherine Loker' is named in her honor as are many facilities in California and Massachusetts.
